Posts Tagged 'Inverstment'

The open-source model has significantly revolutionized not only the IT industry but the business world as well. In fact, it was one of the key "flatteners" Thomas Friedman covered in his tour de force on globalization — The World is Flat. The trend toward collaborating on online projects — including open-source software, blogs, and Wikipedia — remains one of "the most disruptive forces of all."

The success of open-source projects like Linux, Ruby on Rails, and Android reveals the strength and diversity of having developers around the world contributing and providing feedback on code. The community becomes more than the sum of its parts, driving innovation and constant improvement. The case has been made for open source in and of itself, but a debate still rages over the developing case for businesses contributing to open source. Why would a business dedicate resources to the development of something it can't sell?

The answer is simple and straightforward: Contributing to open source fosters a community that can inspire, create and fuel the innovation a business needs to keep providing its customers with even better products. It makes sense ... Having hundreds of developers with different skills and perspectives working on a project can push that project further faster. The end result is a product that benefits the open-source community and the business world. The destiny of the community or the product cannot be defined by a single vendor or business; it's the democratization of technology.

Open-Source Cloud Platforms
Today, there are several open-source cloud platforms vying for industry dominance. SoftLayer has always been a big proponent and supporter of open source, and we've been involved with the OpenStack project from the beginning. In fact, we just announced SoftLayer Object Storage, an offering based on OpenStack Object Storage (code-named Swift). We'll provide code and support for Swift in hopes that it continues to grow and improve. The basic idea behind Swift Object Storage is to create redundant, scalable object storage using clusters of standardized servers to store petabytes of accessible data. I could go on and on about object storage, but I know Marc Jones has a blog specifically about SoftLayer Object Storage being published tomorrow, and I don't want to steal too much of his thunder.

We have to acknowledge and embrace the heterogeneous nature of IT industry. Just as you might use multiple operating systems and hypervisors, we're plan on working with a variety of open-source cloud platforms. Right now, we're looking into supporting initiatives like Eucalyptus, and we have our ear to the street to listen to what our customers are asking for. Our overarching goal is to provide our customers with much-needed technologies that are advancing the hosting industry, and one of the best ways to get to that end is to serve the needs of the open-source community.

As I write this blog post, I can't help but think of it in terms of a the Lord of Rings reference: "One ring to rule them all." The idea that "one ring" is all we need to focus on as a hosting provider just doesn't work when it comes to the open-source community ... It all comes down to enabling choice and flexibility. We'll keep investing in innovation wherever we can, and we'll let the market decide which ring will rule where.

What open-source projects are you working on now? How can SoftLayer get involved?